Slow Burn
by Cold Ember
Summary: All he could do was hope that when that last part of him died, he didn’t take anyone else down with him. Oneshot.


Post-Blowback. A possible explanation for Colby's actions in that ep. So obviously spoilers up to and including that ep. I don't own NUMB3RS, yadda yadda ya… y'all know this drill by now. Thanks to my wonderful beta, pruehall, over on LJ.

_**

* * *

Slow Burn

* * *

**_

He was heading for a burnout and he knew it. He could see the one way ticket in his hand and yet he couldn't do a damn thing to stop it. Hell, if anything he was just helping to speed along the process. He had slept with a material witness in their murder investigation. If that wasn't a career sinker, he didn't have a damn clue what was.

He knew it had been stupid, even as he'd done it. But he just couldn't bring himself to care. He was beyond caring at this point, and that scared him more than anything. The fact that he didn't even care that he was hammering nail after nail into his career's coffin alone was raising more red flags than a communist rally, but he'd determinately ignored every one of them.

But it wasn't his career he was worried about – he could find another job. He wasn't even worried that his complete apathy would get him killed sooner or later. What he was worried about was that his detachment would get someone else killed, one of his team or an innocent civilian.

He was dangerous and he knew it. He knew that he needed to be brought under control and when McGowan had interviewed him, he couldn't help but think that Don wasn't the one that McGowan really needed to be worried about. Don wasn't the loose cannon on the team – he was, but no one else knew it.

He didn't like not being in control. It made him feel powerless, especially when it was himself that he wasn't in control of. He just couldn't reign himself in and he knew that he needed to before he got someone killed.

_When in doubt, empty your magazine._ A good theory in combat, sure, but back here on the streets of LA? Not so much. Restraint was key here and he was slowly losing his.

He'd been slipping ever since that day on the Chinese freighter, slowly at first but then faster and faster until he couldn't even begin to count the strips of himself that fell away daily. It took all of his experience undercover to hide the fact that he didn't have flaming clue in hell who he was anymore, to pretend that everything was alright and that he was still that same guy he had always been.

He didn't even know who "that guy" was anymore. He'd been gone for so long that he now nothing more than a memory, a vague impression. He wanted so badly to be able to be him again, but he couldn't. He was too damaged and too far gone to save anymore.

He was a hollow shell of a human being, pretending to be whole and happy instead of showing how dead he was inside. He'd longed to feel something, anything so badly that when Lynn Potter had kissed him he hadn't even thought twice, hoping that it would wake him up, pull him out of his daze. But it hadn't. Not even the knowledge of how stupid he'd been had any impact on him and he'd realized that, as bad as he thought he'd been, he was farther gone than he'd ever imagined.

And nobody ever noticed. He couldn't blame them; he put all his effort into hiding it, after all. But he wanted someone to realize that he was dying, and to save him, or at least care that he was slowly killing himself. Maybe knowing that someone cared that he was drowning in his own head would be enough to help him pull himself out of the water, if only for a few seconds.

But as much as he wanted someone to see that he was slipping away, he couldn't bring himself to allow his façade of normalcy to crack even a little. He was letting himself die and he wasn't doing a damn thing to stop himself.

It was against all his training to ask for help. For as long as he could remember asking for help or showing any sign of weakness had been the ultimate taboo. He was supposed to be the strong one; he wasn't supposed to need help. He was supposed to be able to survive on his own. Trusting the team to find him when he'd been on the run with Dwayne had been one of the hardest things that he'd ever done, and he'd only managed it because he'd told himself that it was to save the mission. He couldn't let everything that he and Kirkland had learned die with him.

He considers that maybe he started this spiral because he had been prepared to die on the freighter. He'd made his peace and when Lancer had stuck that needle in his chest the only regret that he'd had was all the damage that he had inflicted upon those closest to him. His final thought hadn't been a prayer that he wouldn't die, it had been the thought that it was better this way, and that everyone about whom he cared was better off with him dead because he wouldn't be around to hurt them anymore.

For a while after his rescue he'd truly thought that he was alright, that he could just go back to his old life and forget about everything that had to do with that mission. But months went by and he slowly realized that he was still tied to that chair in the middle of the ocean, all alone. He recognized the signs of PTSD, but he ignored them. He recognized the depression, but he ignored them too. He knew that he was spiraling, but he pretended that he wasn't. He went on pretending that he was alright, that he wasn't the picture perfect case of why there was mandatory counseling after these sorts of affairs.

Lancer had broken his mind, whether or not either of them had known it at the time. He knew that by pretending otherwise he was letting Lancer win but he couldn't bring himself to admit defeat.

Not that it really mattered anymore. Maybe there had been a time when he could have been fixed, but that time was now long past and all he could do was hope that when that last part of him died, he didn't take anyone else down with him.

He fingered his gun absently, considering. It would be easier, no doubt, and it would ensure that he didn't put the rest of his team, or the general public, at risk any longer. But he knew that he wouldn't. Not because he wasn't capable of pulling the trigger and ending a life, even his own, or because he felt that he had something to live for - because he didn't. No, it was because he had a morbid kind of fascination with his own decline. He had a detached sort of interest in seeing just how much of himself he had to lose before he could no longer fool the rest of the world. It was like watching a train wreck: it wasn't something that he particularly wanted to see, but he could bring himself to stop watching.

Some people went out with a big bang, for others death was a slow burn. The difference being how far in advance one saw it coming; it didn't actually have anything to do with how long it took a person to die. His death might appear to be a big bang to everyone else, but Colby knew that his death was a slow burn and that he was running out of fuse.

* * *


End file.
